Northwest Missouri Horticulture Newspaper Column

By: Tim Baker
Northwest Region Horticulture Specialist
University of Missouri Extension
102 Main, Suite 1
Gallatin, MO 64640
660-663-3232
BakerT@missouri.edu

It’s no secret that many agricultural crops require insects to pollinate the flowers and produce fruit. Other crops may get by with wind pollination, or may even be self-pollinating. But many plants won’t produce fruit unless an insect comes along to pollinate the flower.

You may have also heard that our bees are in trouble. Due to mites, other insects, and some unknown causes, wild bees have become rare in many parts of the country. Even beekeepers who are treating their hives for these problems sometimes run into trouble, with sudden and mysterious losses of their hives.

Horticulture producers growing crops that need bees for pollination are especially dependent on these beneficial insects. Many species, such as cucurbit crops, have specialized flowers. One flower will produce pollen, and the other flower produces fruit. The pollen has to be transferred over to the fruit-producing flower, or else you won’t get a fruit. Squash and watermelons provide a good example of this arrangement. Bees are the best pollinators, so you can see why it’s critical to have a good bee population around.

Other crops, such as apples and many other fruit trees, need cross pollination. That means the pollen from one variety is needed to pollinate another variety. Again, bees willingly provide that service, and do a great job. But without bees, apple growers are likely to come up short.

Bees also need to have good weather to pollinate well. If it’s cool and wet, they don’t fly much and stay near the hive. Thus, if it’s cool and wet during apple bloom time, you may see a reduced yield.

This past spring, I heard several complaints from growers with early crops who just weren’t seeing enough bees. Their squash plants, for example, would start out with the miniature squash just underneath the flower that is supposed to grow and produce a harvestable squash, but would soon fall off. That’s because it wasn’t pollinated properly. I would ask if they were seeing much bee activity. “No”, was the answer.

The grower would often ask where he could get bees. Unfortunately, that isn’t easy in our area. While there are a few beekeepers around, moving hives is a major undertaking, and few of them are set up to offer bee pollination services.

So the solution, I believe, is for growers themselves to become beekeepers. While not all growers may want to do this, if a few would start keeping bees, this would certainly help. Some might even want to become big enough to offer pollination services to their fellow growers.

To aid this process, University of Missouri Extension is planning a couple of meetings to introduce this fascinating topic to growers and anyone else who might have an interest in beekeeping.

The main speaker will be Raymond Heldenbrand, a local beekeeper from Winston. He will bring an observation hive, full of bees, so that you can see them in action. We will also show you photos of his beekeeping operation, and he will discuss the basics and answer your questions.

Depending on the level of interest, we hope to develop a series of training classes that will go into greater depth for new beekeepers.


	Horticulture for Northwest Missouri University of Missouri Extension Updated 12/08/09
Tim Baker Horticulture Specialist 102 N Main, Suite 1, Gallatin, MO 64640 660-663-3232 BakerT@missouri.edu		Tom Fowler Horticulture Specialist 4125 Mitchell Ave., St. Joseph, MO 64507 816-279-1691 FowlerT@missouri.edu